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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 12, 2007 - 04:26 PM |
 
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| Post subject: Labrador behavioral problems.... |
Any pet experts here can help with some Lab behavioral problems I'm having ???
Dog is about 9 months old and is starting some bad habits and continuing others that are not desirable.
1. Likes to occasionally chew corners of walls.
2. Sometimes pees and poos inside - but getting better.
3. Absolute destroys things when left alone [worst problem yet] - even for short periods of time, seems like she has serious separation anxiety. |
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lemongrass
StreetBeater
Joined: Jan 15, 2005
Posts: 2437
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Aug 12, 2007 - 08:59 PM |
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1. Did you give her something to chew up? Every time my puppy finishes eating the chewing toys he definitely chews up the curtain or the towel or the tissue. But no corners of walls. That could be a sign of lacking of some certain substance.
2. For puppy younger than 12 months old, their urine system is not fully developed which means they cant control the pee and poo at times. Once they are adult they only pee 1-2 times and poo once per day. (I have 2 dogs, one 7 months old and the other 5.5 years old)
3. I am having the similiar problem. Recently if I leave him home alone he PISSES on my bed. He is still a puppy so he pees at a certain place in the balcony, which is approved. BUT pissing on my bed is a big big big NO NO. The door of the balcony is fully opened all day, he can go there any time he wants. I think he is doing this to revenge on me for being left alone.
I am washing the bedding the 2nd times since last night.  |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 12, 2007 - 09:08 PM |
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1. She's got about 20 toys to chew - new ones, old ones, big ones, small ones.
2. Damn - 3 more months of the 'break in cycle' to go...
3. Wow - pisses ON the bed ??? Balcony for me is also ok, better than inside on the hard wood floors.
I really need to get a handle on this pet thing, I don't want [or need] her to dictate my schedule 24 / 7 - I realize she's a responsibility, but I also think she demands an excessive amount of attention / time. Relentless little thing... |
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kimmie
Reacher
Joined: Apr 12, 2007
Posts: 256
Status: Offline
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Aug 12, 2007 - 09:54 PM |
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Is your puppy crate trained? Our lab was, and considers his crate a place of refuge instead of a prison. When he was a puppy (and energetic, destructive, anxiety prone) we crated him whenever we left and he never developed any ill will towards it. We usually left some chew toys or a bone to keep him occupied. Now whenever we leave he rushes into his crate and stays in there even with the doors wide open. |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 13, 2007 - 12:21 AM |
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We crate ours as well when we leave, that was until she dropped a huge poop bomb in it and decided to go crazy and splatter that and about a liter of piss all over the surrounding walls, floors, etc. the other day. We came home to nothing short of shear amazement... we also throw a milkbone, chew toy, etc. in with her, but she runs from it / us when we are about to leave and sees it as a prison.
Not sure what is up with her lately, but she seems to be getting worse and 'needier' as the days go by. Needs almost constant attention - and when we aren't giving it to her she gets mischievous and destructive. |
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kimmie
Reacher
Joined: Apr 12, 2007
Posts: 256
Status: Offline
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Aug 13, 2007 - 06:59 AM |
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two words: doggie prozac. |
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kimmie
Reacher
Joined: Apr 12, 2007
Posts: 256
Status: Offline
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Aug 13, 2007 - 09:37 AM |
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Some thoughts of the potty training. What do you do when you catch her doing it inside? She really should be done with potty training at 9 months I would think. Our current rambunctious lab (our family have had 3 successive labs) was fully potty trained around 9 months. The last time he did it inside the house (around 9 months) we caught him in mid-act, immediately reprimanded him with a very loud firm "NO!" then rubbed his nose in it, then gave him a quick firm whack on the nose (they esp. don't like to be touched in there). This seemed effective as it was the very last time he ever pottied inside again.
Also sounds like yours may be doing it out of spite/anxiety, and even though labs are very needy affectionate dogs (females more than males it seems) yours does seem to have serious separation anxiety issues that makes her neediness and destructive behavior worse. Is she getting enough exercise (mentally and physically)? Labs especially need LOTS of exercise and activity or they will turn destructive. We use to take ours hiking in the mountains around Lake Tahoe at every possible chance just to burn off all that energy. Not sure what you can do here other than running her around the neighborhood and playing fetch outside. Is there a doggy park you can take her to for some energetic socialization with other dogs? That will tire her out both mentally and physically. Doggy playgroup.
Seriously though if giving her ample attention and playing with her doesn't seem to help, you should perhaps look into anti-anxiety medication for her if her destructive behavior continues. Keep trying the crating, maybe add a comfortable doggy mattress and make it available at all times, even when you're home (although it worries me she pottied in there). We use to keep the crate in an area of the house where our lab would be near family activity, and eventually he just went there on his own to sleep or relax, even when we were there. Good luck and keep us updated. I'd be curious to know what happens. Labs are like perpetual toddlers, until they age. Then all they want to do is sleep  |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 13, 2007 - 11:08 AM |
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^ We walk her at least four or five times a day - although probably for not as long as she'd like, so maybe the excessive energy thing is something to seriously consider. She got really crazy [when she was 0 - 3 months] still trying to grow up and get coordination and jumped on a few small kids around our building so we are hesitant to let her go off the leash as she's not well enough behaved outside yet [doesn't listen to oral commands strictly enough] to trust her not to do something like that again. We live next to a HUGE park - but ironically enough it forbids any type of pets inside.
I'll start working with her more - but finding even more time will be difficult. We'll see how it goes here - I want to avoid putting her on any type of medication - absolute last resort only. |
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Flyingsnow
Barker
Joined: Nov 09, 2006
Posts: 160
Location: Shanghai
Status: Offline
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Aug 13, 2007 - 04:25 PM |
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| Post subject: Lab troubles |
Well, I think you have a dog with some pretty significant seperation anxiety issues. There are some things you can try to reduce her distress. First, I would get a closed airline type crate if the one you have is the open wire mesh variety. It should be nice and denlike, large enough for her to stand and turn around but not much more. (I had a dog that would shake the wire mesh crate until he could see a weak point and then force his body through the weak point to get out. I got an airline crate and he was like a different dog - no problem staying in the crate. ) Put a tshirt that you've worn in the crate. The scent will be very comforting to her. Let her stay in the crate for short periods of time when you are home. If she barks/whines, tap the top of the crate and say "no bark". If she can only stay in for 2 min. without complaint then take her out at 2 min. and do something fun with her. Keep adding a little bit of time to the duration tha she's expected to be quiet.(2.5 min.,3 min.5 min)
Create a pavlovian response that will calm her when you leave - Pick a piece of music, about 20 min. long(pick one you like because you will be hearing it a lot). Sit with your dog, pet her and play the music. Just pet her and be quiet and calm. Do this at least daily for 2 weeks. The more you practice the better chance it has to work. After you've done this for 2 weeks, play the music when you go out and hopefully it will help calm her.
Lots of exercise for labs. They are working dogs and if they don't have work they invent mischief. Basic obedience training is an absolute must (heel, sit, stay, down). Make her work for everything, before you feed her she has to sit, etc. Praise, praise, praise when she does somthing right. Make sure she's reliable on lead before moving to off lead work. Labs like to find things and you can invent games where she has to find something in your apt.
House training - unless you catch her in the act of going in the house don't even bother reprimanding her - she won't have a clue what the issue is. If you catch her in the act, it's "bad dog", take her outside immediately, if she goes when you get outside - praise. Praise her when she poops/pees on your walks. The good thing is that labs live to please and will try to comply when they understand what is expected of them.
Hope this helps. |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 13, 2007 - 05:55 PM |
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^ Thx - going to try as much of the above as possible and will look into formal obedience training as well.
Hopefully with some work she'll grow out of some bad habits. |
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bougie
Board Buddha
Joined: Nov 20, 2004
Posts: 14629
Location: Wuhan Hubei China
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Aug 13, 2007 - 07:30 PM |
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^ Yes , I could say the same about my wife .. 
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 13, 2007 - 09:52 PM |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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| Posted:
Aug 15, 2007 - 05:51 PM |
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| Post subject: Re: Lab troubles |
| Flyingsnow wrote: |
| First, I would get a closed airline type crate if the one you have is the open wire mesh variety. |
Wouldn't happen to know where to get one of these here, would you ??
| Flyingsnow wrote: |
| Put a tshirt that you've worn in the crate. The scent will be very comforting to her. |
This didn't help so much, she used the t-shirt as toilet paper... I think I need to work with her incrementally like you said in your post.
Obedience school is right around the corner for her.
Thanks for the suggestions - working on long term solutions, day by day now. |
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Flyingsnow
Barker
Joined: Nov 09, 2006
Posts: 160
Location: Shanghai
Status: Offline
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Aug 17, 2007 - 01:05 PM |
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I don't know where you can buy an airline crate but I will ask around. I stopped at the pet supply store at Thumb Plaza and they don't carry that type of crate, only the wire ones. If I get a lead I will post it. Sorry about your tshirt. Separation anxiety is pretty hard to deal with - it will take some time. |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 17, 2007 - 03:57 PM |
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kimmie
Reacher
Joined: Apr 12, 2007
Posts: 256
Status: Offline
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Aug 17, 2007 - 06:02 PM |
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DS, a good way to give your lab some mental exercise is to get that hollow rubber tube/cone (found at pet stores) and smear something like peanut butter or jam deep inside. Most labs are very food orientated and she will hopefully spend enough time trying to eat the stuff that it will tire her out somewhat. And I agree wholeheartedly with FlyingSnow in that labs are very "biddable" and respond very well to positive reinforcement using praises and food in their love to please their master. And if the obedience training doesn't seem to take at first, don't give up. It took our last lab 2 complete classes and about 3 months of intense training before he was reliable off lead. Even then, he will still rush to greet strangers and other dogs, but will usually return if he's called back in a happy tone and given a treat as a reward.
If you can't locate an enclosed airline type crate here, maybe you can rig something similar that would cover most of the crate. Maybe by draping large blankets over most of it, leaving enough gaps for ventilation? |
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kimmie
Reacher
Joined: Apr 12, 2007
Posts: 256
Status: Offline
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Aug 17, 2007 - 06:25 PM |
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and you might to read John Grogan's "Marley and Me" while you're going through this for some humorous commiseration on the trials of owning a "difficult" lab.  |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 17, 2007 - 06:57 PM |
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| kimmie wrote: |
| DS, a good way to give your lab some mental exercise is to get that hollow rubber tube/cone (found at pet stores) and smear something like peanut butter or jam deep inside. Most labs are very food orientated and she will hopefully spend enough time trying to eat the stuff that it will tire her out somewhat. |
It's called a 'Kong' and we use it constantly - she's pretty persistent with it, so I guess it's helping some. |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 28, 2007 - 08:23 PM |
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Update:
K9 Jialiang, web: www.jialiang.com
Thought about taking my dog there for 'obedience' school / training... what a J O K E.
The place was nothing short of hell for pets. We talked to a rep for them, although they advertise it as such, seems like the 'training' your pet receives is only done twice a day and only for 30 min. sessions each time. The remaining 23 hrs. a day they are kept in what I would consider as pens. Although the pens were clean and a fair amount of the animals that were there looked healthy, they seemed a little offended when I asked if they were more of a 'kennel' or 'boarding house'. On top of all of this the quoted price for my Lab to go through basic behavior training was $1000 USD / month - includes 24 hrs. stay, food and ONE hour of training a day.
I can't say they didn't have an over-abundance of little pet trinkets, bones, cages, etc. to sell and the establishment looked moderate (NOTHING like their website) - but when I was there, there wasn't a single animal outside of it's cage being trained, exercised or otherwise. I'm no expert, but I could run a better training facility than this and I know NOTHING about the subject.
Be warned. |
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iara
Fire-eater
Joined: June 09, 2006
Posts: 2656
Location: brazil-shanghai
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Aug 29, 2007 - 07:56 AM |
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I also heardt bad things about this place...
It's expensive and people there don't seem to care about pets anyway 
Now I'm taking my dog, a Golden Retriever to a vet less than 10 min. from my place, near Seasons.
It's a small pet shop with a clinic upstairs, the doc seems to know what he is doing.
My dog had a skin problem and I took her to Shanghai Naughty Pets and to another place that I don't recall the name and she still wasn't ok.
When we came back from our vacation her skin was terrible, loosing a lot of furr, now after one month she is cured.
And the girls that give her baths seems to love pets, cause they're allways happy with the animals there.
And the place it's clean!
DS, I saw some airline type crates there, but medium size, next time I can ask them if they have or can get a big one and how much (once I called K9 Jialiang and it was about rmb4000 for one! |
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I'm my husband slave! |
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DesertSpider
Post Boaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2007
Posts: 4725
Location: SHANGHAI, CHINA
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Aug 29, 2007 - 09:58 AM |
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dfoo
Post Roaster
Joined: Jan 19, 2005
Posts: 4693
Status: Offline
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Aug 29, 2007 - 11:21 AM |
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The problem is that labs are generally hell on 4 legs -- especially when young. My family always owned Labs in Canada, and even there they are a severe challenge. They are extremely energetic and if they have no place to release that energy then they will find other, generally unacceptable, avenues such as chewing holes in walls, destroying dog cages, eating furniture, etc. In Shanghai due to lack of space its impossible for you to exercise your dog sufficiently to release all of that energy (basically run like hell for 1-2 hours). The only thing you can do is walk your dog as often as possible, and crate him when you are not around to prevent him from destroying your home.
Anyway, don't worry too much. They generally calm down shortly before death |
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gothsusie
Ranter
Joined: Oct 24, 2005
Posts: 522
Location: Shanghai
Status: Offline
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Sep 06, 2007 - 01:39 PM |
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DesertSpider... Good luck training your dog. Some dogs are more difficult than others and your type of breed is definitely very energetic and always looking for something to do (loves to chew). So you definitely have a challenge on your hands. I would definitely recommend that you get yourself one of those airline crate ASAP to see if that helps. My dog is trained for a crate but we use one of those metal ones but I imagine an airline crate would be better. I've seen them at PAWs... Pets are Wonderful Vet office and they had a large size crate last time I passed by about a week ago. The crates were OK, only thing I didn't like about them is that they don't have vents on the back side but on the other 2 sides had some vents so should be alright. The phone number for PAWs is 5254 0611. Sorry but I don't have the address on me. Give them a call so you can ask them if they still have the crate and if you are interested then they can give you the address. I'm sure they have them elsewhere but can't remember right now. Good luck! |
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gothsusie
Ranter
Joined: Oct 24, 2005
Posts: 522
Location: Shanghai
Status: Offline
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Sep 06, 2007 - 01:44 PM |
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BTW, my puppy dog is now 2.5 years old but when I first got her she was 3 months old and had the worst separation anxiety problem I've seen. I was afraid to leave our apartment for the first month or two because she would cry so much and poop and pee all over. She would cry so loud that I could hear her outside of our building. I was afraid that my neighbors would complain and since I just had gotten her I didn't have a license yet (I was actually fostering her at the time but decided a few weeks later to keep her permanently). Fortunately, with much patience and training things got better in the following months. I must say crate training her was the key to her overcoming this problem but every dog is a little bit different so what worked for me might not work for you. |
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treespirit
Post Roaster
Joined: Jan 02, 2006
Posts: 4690
Location: on an island
Status: Offline
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Sep 07, 2007 - 07:00 AM |
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Desert- I've had labs on and off all my life. They are definitely slow to mature mentally, takes about 2-3 years for them to really be an adult. Crate training is essential for your dog. If she messes in her crate calmly take her out...restraining her with a lead...clean the crate (do not use an ammonia based product) and place her back in the crate. Keep her in the crate while home, removing her to go outside...when she is successful eliminating outside praise her, give a treat and then you may allow her to be out of the crate in the house while supervised for short periods. If she doesn't eliminate outside put her back in the crate for a while then try again. When you crate her use a go word such as "Kennel!" as you put her in (it's also best to use a word when she pees/poops outside like "go". Once she's in give her a very yummy treat, you must completely ignore any antics like whining while in the crate. (If she can't see on one side of the crate and she is making a fuss you can try sneaking up to it and slapping your hand down hard on top, don't say anything. She will associate that loud noise with her bad behavior and probably stop) Everytime you take her out of the crate (whether she's messed or not) take her immmediately outside until she is fully house trained with no mistakes. A thing I have found that works well for bad behavior is taking an empty cola can and putting a bunch of coins (I use pennies) in it, seal the opening...everytime you catch her doing something naughty shake that can and make a bunch of noise, they really don't like it and will develop a bad association with the behavior. I really empathize with you, it's so frustrating to go through. Just try to remember positive reinforcement of good behavior and the least amount of direct attention you can do on the bad behavior. Oh, and for the anxiety, whatever you do do not try to "comfort" her when she seeks you out with anxious behavior, this reinforces for her that there is indeed something to be anxious about, it is best to go about your business and ignore the behavior (especially works for things like thunder/ fireworks type anxiety), she will gradually get the idea that you won't reward for it. Good luck, it will get better! |
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